cinemadaily | Towards Berlin - indieWIRE 2/16/10 1:10 PM

cinemadaily | Towards Berlin by Andy Lauer (February 10, 2010)

The 2010 Berlinale begins tomorrow. indieWIRE has the competition lineup which includes Sundance titles like Lisa Cholodenkoʼs “The Kids Are All Right” and Michael Winterbottomʼs “The Killer Inside Me,” as well as the world premieres of new films from Noah Baumbach and Thomas Vinterberg.

However, “the two most-talked-about films this Berlin…are likely to be Roman Polanskiʼs ʻThe Ghost Writerʼ and Martin Scorseseʼs Leonardo DiCaprio starrer ʻShutter Island,ʼ both bowing in world premieres in Berlin this week,” predicts the Hollywood Reporterʼs Scott Roxborough. According to Cinematical, “Polanskiʼs latest stars Ewan McGregor as a professional ghost writer whoʼs brought in at the last minute to help the former British Prime Minister (Pierce Brosnan) finish his memoir after the PMʼs previous ghost writer (and close friend) mysteriously drowned. When he begins to discover some A scene from Roman Polanski's "The Ghost Writer." dark secrets the PM may have been trying to hide, our ghost writer suddenly finds this chance of a lifetime slowly turn into a life and death situation.” Watch the trailer on YouTube. Varietyʼs Ed Meza talks with Berlin programmer Dieter Kosslick about the controversy surrounding the film.

“One can only hope Noah Baumbachʼs follow-up to ʻMargot at the Wedding,ʼ ʻGreenbergʼ starring Ben Stiller, Greta Gerwig, Rhys Ifans and Baumbachʼs wife Jennifer Jason Leigh, is better than ʻMargot,ʼ but weʼll see…” muses Joe Bowman over at his blog. The Playlist isnʼt worried: “It looks kind of awesome. Humorous, ironic, but seemingly not shying away from a lot of emotion and grave subjects or tenors. And Ben Stiller, who we were really worried about in this thing (he had to replace Mark Ruffalo after all) looks great in the trailer. We are pleasantly surprised, as we were iffy about his ability to do drama.” Watch the trailer for “Greenberg” on YouTube. Meanwhile, indieWIREʼs Peter Knegt picks the film as a potential breakout hit.

”Submarino,” the latest from Danish director Thomas Vinterberg (“Festen”), is also set to premiere at Berlin. According to the festival, the films is “the story of two brothers who lose track of each other after an unstable childhood until they meet up again in prison.” “In programming Dogma 95 co-founder Thomas Vinterbergʼs estranged-brothers drama ʻSubmarino,ʼ and marathon runner-cum-bank robber drama ʻThe Robberʼ by Benjamin Heisenberg (whose magazine Revolver first published the Dogma manifesto in Germany), fest makes a quiet, maybe unintentional, nod to the long-defunct Danish movement it helped platform in Dogmaʼs better days (ʻMifune,ʼ ʻItalian for Beginnersʼ),” notes Varietyʼs Derek Elley in his preview of the festival. Watch the trailer for Submarino on YouTube.

Screen Dailyʼs Jonathan Romney: “Among this yearʼs German-language entries are two films based on true stories. Particularly likely to grab its share of the headlines in the German press is ʻJud Süss — A Film Without Conscience.ʼ Directed by Oskar Roehler, ʻJud Süssʼ is an account of the making of Veit Harlanʼs notorious 1940 propaganda film, one of the key exhibits of Nazi cinema. Berlinale red-carpet regular Moritz Bleibtreu plays Joseph Goebbels.” indieWIRE already has word on several of the Sundance titles that are making their way to Berlin. Check out our roundup of two of the films likely to attract more attention when they play at Berlin: Michael Winterbottomʼs “The Killer Inside Me” and Lisa Cholodenkoʼs “The Kids Are All Right.”

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